Olympic Torch Relay
by Echoes of Shadows
Summary: It is Day 46 of the Olympic Torch's 70-day relay trip around Britain. In the spirit of millions of his people, England decides watch the torch pass through the streets of his country, and invites America and France along for the experience.


**Warning: contains England's language, France being France, and random facts about the Olympic Torch and Bear Grylls.  
I don't own Hetalia, the Olympics, or mentioned brand names. **

* * *

"C'mon, c'mon, we're gonna be late!" The excitable American danced around his two companions, a giant smile across his face.

The three – America, England and France – were walking down a main road at the edge of the town. Already, as it had been for quite some time, the road was lined with crowds all along the torch's planned path, in some places three or four people deep. Several were waving Union Jack flags and banners, and a few, mainly children, were holding paper models of the torch. Had it been possible to view the scene from above, the hopeful viewers would have looked like moths, all drawn as if magnetically to a lightbulb, or more appropriately, a flame. England had never seen it quite so busy around here. The road – closed off to ordinary traffic – was already occupied by the start of the convoy, but this was mainly police motorbikes making sure the road was clear before the torch's momentous arrival.

Frankly, though, England was just glad that it wasn't raining. Lately, the skies had been pretty clear on defining the term 'British summer', and it had been tipping it down most of the past month. But he'd risked the weather to go out and join his people on the streets today, just to see how things were for them. It was easy to get elevated and disconnected, being who he was, and it never paid to get out of touch with what the populace thought. The last time that happened, he'd ended up with a beheaded king, and he didn't want that to happen again. In the spirit of the occasion, he'd invited his former charge and the frog along to watch, but he was beginning to regret his thoughtfulness already.

England rolled his eyes at his lively companion. "Calm down. We've got ten minutes and we're pretty much there. And stop jumping about so much, you look like an idiot."

"Aw, but I'm excited though," America pouted, but dropped into stride on England's other side.

France laughed. "I hate to say it, _Angleterre_, but I think _Amerique _is right. There are a lot of people here already. It seems to be quite popular, and there is a chance we won't get a good viewing space."

"There were plenty of spaces left, frog," England retorted. "Let's just go down a bit further."

France merely shrugged. "If you say so, _cheri_."

At first, the crowds were as thick as ever, and twice as enthusiastic. But England was quickly proven correct; some way further up the road the crowd began to thin, spreading out with sizeable gaps between groups. The security marshals in their bright yellow jackets were scattered about, some pacing up the road, others keeping people away from areas blocked by fencing. Slightly past this, the three quickly settled at the edge of the grass verge, right at the edge of the road. They could see for about a hundred metres up, then their view was blocked by a combination of the ever-present crowd and a roundabout.

"Yanno," America puffed. "I reckon the reason that there's a massive gap here is 'cos no one could be bothered to walk all this way up."

England didn't answer him – he was too busy pulling his camera out of the pocket of his leather jacket. It was still a few minutes before the torch was due to arrive, but he wanted to be ready. The faded T-shirt underneath the jacket perfectly matched the flags that were being waved in all directions, and his thick Doc Martens sunk slightly into the rain-saturated grass. It felt good to be out of his uniform for once, standing out here just as one of the people. It was at times like this that he was especially proud of who he was.

Police motorbikes emblazoned in white and fluorescent yellow kept passing by in front of them, along with the occasional white van with _Torch Relay_ _2012_ lit up on the front. It was quite a lengthy convoy, and most of it was security. Suddenly the faint throbbing of music pierced the air as a reddish blob appeared in the at the far end of the road.

"Is it here yet?" America asked, leaning forward off the pavement to try see past the crowds.

France quickly yanked him back. "Get off the road. And I don't think so. What's the music?"

England peered around, then realised what was going on and shook his head in disappointment. "Sponsors," he said dismissively. "They paid for some of the torch, and so they've got legal rights to make giant prats of themselves."

The reddish blob quickly revealed itself to be a large vehicle covered in the Coca-Cola logo, complete with giant loudspeakers blaring Aerosmith's _Walk this Way_, and an over-enthusiastic guy stood on the roof shouting happily into a microphone. America, whose sponsor parades were often much grander than this, was unperturbed, and cheerfully shouting back replies to the guy on the roof. Whereas England was trying not to show his distaste too obviously. To him, this was just blatant over-advertising, and the companies shouldn't be taking advantage of an event like this.

Meanwhile, America was getting distracted by the red-clad Coca-Cola marshals, who were handing out freebies to the crowd.

"Free Coke?" America exclaimed, jumping forward and excitedly receiving a small bottle. "This is the best day ever! These guys are awesome!" He quickly wrenched off the lid and began to gulp the sweet brown liquid. England declined a bottle of his own, preferring to have a nice cup of tea when he got home, but France gained a delighted America's favour by donating him his.

Right after this came a bright blue vehicle decorated with Samsung's logo, its loudspeakers playing a song England didn't know. His face twisted in disapproval as he noticed a large television was built into the side in an attempt to gain yet more unwilling viewers. An oversized face was advertising something he wasn't interested in was displayed up on the screen and a few girls in blue skirts were dancing about on the top with glittery blue pom-poms. He quickly swatter America around the head for dancing about, then turned to receive a plastic flag from one of the Samsung employees. He shook his head sadly as he noticed that one side of the flag was adorned with the Samsung logo instead of the three crosses of the Union Jack. _Utter blasphemy, this is_, he thought mournfully.

The final van belonging to the main sponsors was a white and green affair belonging to Lloyds TSB, one of England's major banks. It too had loudspeakers, but their song of choice was Kesha's _Tik Tok_, thumping through the air and ground with its repetitive bassline. England was highly disappointed by this. Not only was it not a good song, it wasn't even a British song. Surely it couldn't have been hard to find something inspiring or appropriate to play along the route, even if there had already probably been forty-five previous days of music.

"I have to say, I'm disappointed that the Lloyds van isn't handing out tenners," Francis quipped as the van passed by up the road, followed by more flashing blue police motorbikes.

"It's all been paid out in bonuses to some dodgy banker," England replied, and the two shared a laugh.

America stopped his flag-waving and turned to stare blankly at them. "I don't get it. What's so funny, guys?"

England waved a hand. "Nevermind."

"Is your camera ready, _Angleterre_?" Francis asked, craning his neck around. His watch was now reading ten past, the time that the torch was due to arrive on the previous road, and from the sounds of the crowd on the other side of the roundabout, the flame was very close indeed.

England was quietly cursing next to them, irately poking buttons on the camera clutched between his fingers. "No. Blasted thing's not turning on. And it can't be out of batteries already, because I fully charged them yesterday. Work, damn you!" His fingers scrabbled at the battery case, trying to persuade the camera into working. To his frustration, the battery refused to move, almost jammed inside its holder. He swore under his breath, trying to wedge his fingernails down the side to lever it out with.

France's eyes were fixed down the road, along with America, who was cheering loudly in harmony with the rest of the crowd, waving his arms about madly. "I think it is coming, _mon ami_."

England growled, speeding up his infuriated efforts to pry the battery free. He'd be seriously annoyed if he missed recording the event just because his stupid camera stubbornly decided not to work. Yes, he had the BBC's live feed and video highlights, and he'd been at the presentation at the start, but it wasn't quite the same as having photos he'd taken with his own camera. Which still was stuck. He jabbed his index finger on the battery case, and finally the cell came free. Relieved, he was about to stick it back in and retry, but then he noticed that the little + and - symbols on the case weren't matching the ones on the battery pack.

"The sodding battery's in the wrong way round!" England cried out exasperatedly, clipping it back in the right way and shutting the case, while cursing his own stupidity. To his relief, the device blipped into life just as the yellow-and-white BBC camera van came into view. The small black box on the rear of the large van's roof was streaming video footage of the torch's progress live to the BBC's website, and to televisions nationwide.

About twenty feet behind the BBC's vehicle was the torch itself, a three-foot cylinder of gold metal punctured with hundreds of little holes, clasped firmly in the hand of its bearer and symbolically held aloft to the sky. At the top of the cylinder was a leaping orange flame, standing out bright and clear in front of the leaf-strewn backdrop of trees. It was essentially the same flame that had travelled thousands of miles on its way to London. Ignited in Olympia, Greece, by concentrating the sun's rays in a mirror, then flown to Cornwall and relayed all over Britain by its inspiring bearers. It was quite an iconic journey, one the country would remember for quite some time. Its arrival in the vicinity had set off an electrified crowd to fever point, and the noise levels reached a peak. Cheers were most prominent, but there was a veritable choir of different whistle notes, both from the mouths of spectators and from the variety of plastic whistles that had been handed out earlier.

Along either side of the torch, at the edges of the road, were more marshals, clad in grey T-shirts and shorts with yellow piping. Their primary purpose was probably to keep people from jumping in front of the torch, or trying to steal it, but England just thought they were a nuisance, getting in the way of people's photography. He himself had his camera poised and his finger on the shutter.

"Hmm," France pondered as he watched the torch approach. "I have to say, _Angleterre_, it is somewhat smaller than I had been led to expect." A smirk crossed his face, and he shot a bright wink at England, who was used to the constant double-entendres and ignored him in favour of taking photos. To their right, America was waving his flag like Italy in the face of an army and yelling excited nonsense. Both bottles of Coke had vanished, and he was evidently already hyper off the sugar. He'd been quite the England enthusiast lately, what with the royal wedding last year, and now this, but no one was expecting it to last once the celebrations were over and the novelty had worn off.

"Get off the road, you view-blocking wanker!" England snapped at the idiot in a red coat who'd stepped off the pavement in front of him and into the way of his picture. He was about to curse further, but then remembered that there were children nearby and decided to keep his language to himself.

The torch still had quite some way to go, so it wasn't long before it had passed by and was blocked by the mob that was further up the road.

"That's it?" America asked, watching the crowd surge past them to keep following the torch.

"Well, yes," England admitted. "Unless you want to go up further and try catch it again."

"Could we?" France asked, his skepticism obvious.

England nodded. "It's not moving very fast, we could easily overtake it. At the very least, I could try getting some more decent photies."

"Let's go!" was the prompt reply from America. He always seemed to have boundless energy, especially in an excited crowd, but England had to remember that he was still relatively young for a nation. Had he really been like that once?

England set off at a light jog and led the way up the grass verge that ran the length of the road, with America and France in pursuit. The ground was still fairly squelchy, but that was due to the rain-soaked June that had just passed, and England had grown used to it. He could hear France complaining about it behind him. He dodged swiftly around smaller trees and other spectators dawdling their way after the torch, and within half a minute he'd reached the start of another roundabout. The main convoy was back in sight, and the throng of people still as thick as ever, clustered around the roundabout's exit and traffic islands.

"Dude," America puffed. "Slow down a bit. I'm not used to running."

England scoffed and kept up his previous pace, which hadn't even been particularly fast. "That's because you drive everywhere, fatboy."

"Hey! I'm not fat, I'm just lots of Hero!" America protested between panted breaths.

They found another gap about halfway up the next road, just under a lamppost blooming with hanging-baskets of summer flowers. The torch was now about thirty metres behind them, but the BBC van in front of it appeared to have stopped.

France frowned. "Is there a problem back there?"

"Hmm?" England glanced back, and realised what was happening, and why there was a big gap where they were. Its previous occupants had gone back for a better look. "It's a handover!"

Indeed it was. It was slightly hard to see from where they were, but as marshals got the crowd back in line, the scene was gradually revealed. The original torchbearer they'd seen a few minutes ago had met up with an older man in a similar white tracksuit, who was holding an identical gold cylinder, only without a flame atop it. The two leant the torches towards each other, the heads meeting in mid-air. After a few seconds of tense pausing, the top of the second torch burst into flame, causing the crowd around it to cheer. For a second, the two torches burnt as one, then the second torchbearer moved his torch away and held it high for all to see.

"Dude, there's two!" America exclaimed in surprise, pointing with a black-gloved finger towards the handover behind them. He was clearly puzzled by the appearance of a duplicate torch.

France smiled. "Don't be silly, _Amerique._ A single torch would get too hot or damaged to keep going for seventy days straight, and it would certainly run out of fuel. They made several, didn't they, _Angleterre_?"

"Eight thousand, to be precise," England agreed, as they kept jogging across the damp grass. "One for each torchbearer."

America looked shocked. "Really? Do they get to keep them?"

"Indeed," England nodded. "Several have turned up on eBay for about ten thousand pounds, although why anyone would want to sell theirs is quite beyond me."

Flame transferred, the new torchbearer set off, still at a slow, leisurely pace that was far from the Olympian speed hinted by adverts and promotions. But he was holding the torch proudly in the air as he walked, smiling broadly and waving to the cheering crowds. The bright orange flame danced in the breeze, drawing eyes like a magnet with iron filings.

England, America and France kept following its slow but steady progress along the road, behind the main crowd, but still with a half-decent view. The flame was high enough for it to be visible above the line of heads, kept prominent as always. England was still clicking away with his camera whenever he had a decent shot of the torch. A group of primary-school children, their heads decorated with home-made laurel wreaths, lined the edge of the pavement in front of their school, whistling and cheering in little high-pitched voices. It looked like the whole school had turned out to watch, and England wouldn't have been surprised if they had suspended lessons for this once-in-a-lifetime occasion. Ah, to be a child, running around without any of the cares or responsibilities that kept him awake all night.

Yet all too soon the torch had progressed out of view again, past a pelican crossing and around another roundabout. It was followed shortly by a large bus with blacked-out windows, presumably carrying either officials or further torch-bearers. England tried to keep following, but the crowds were beginning to thicken again, and eventually a group of slow-moving people blocked the trio from moving up any further, just as they were approaching the traffic lights.

"We should have gone further ahead and caught up with the Coke van for more free Cokes," America said thoughtfully, one hand to his chin.

"You'd have passed out from exhaustion by then, it's too far up front," England retorted.

America stuck his tongue out at his former caretaker. "Shut up, old man."

"Should we try overtaking it again?" France asked his bushy-browed companion before England could retort back at America with further insults.

England watched the crowds, clustered around the next handover some fifty or sixty metres in front. The road ahead was closer to the centre of town, and the clusters of spectators were much denser, up to ten people deep in places. There didn't look to be any further space. It didn't help that the pavement was much narrower ahead, and people around them were still intent on following the flame onward.

He shook his head. "No. We'd never get up there. Too busy. Time to call it a day, I think."

"Alright," America replied cheerfully. "We got in a pretty good view though. Would have seen it better if I'd have watched it on the internet, but it's always worth seeing something like that up close."

France nodded. "It's probably for the best. Those clouds are looking rather ominous," – he pointed upwards towards the overcast sky – "and I don't want to get wet."

"That's a good point, Franny. Hey Artie. What happens if it rains?" America asked. "Yanno, it's been raining a lot here and stuff. Doesn't the fire get wet?"

England's hand hit his forehead with an audible _smack_. "'Doesn't the fire get wet.' I sometimes wonder where you have left your linguistic ability, America. Anyway, the torch works in rain, snow, winds of up to thirty-five miles per hour and altitudes of up to four hundred feet. It's been extensively tested for safety, and to stand up to my characteristic weather."

"Mmm," France agreed. "Everyone knows you've always been wet and blustery."

Facts forgotten, England rounded on France, thick eyebrows low over his eyes in a furious glare. "Oi! Keep your slander and lies to yourself, you wine-soaked cretin!"

"Ahaha!" America laughed. "You guys never stop fighting, even if we're not in meetings.

"Oh, shut up," England replied. "Let's just go home, so I can have a nice cup of tea and send this wine bastard back to his vineyard."

"I know you love me really," France smiled as the three turned to go up a side road. Once they were off the main route, everything was much quieter, and the only people here now were heading back home like they were.

"I still think the best torch thingy was when Bear Grylls went down that zipwire over that river," America mused as they walked. "He's the guy that drinks his own piss, isn't he?"

England sighed again. Being around America really was tiring. "He's the Chief Scout, America. He only did that one time on _Born Survivor _as a way of preventing dehydration in extreme conditions. Or _Man vs. Wild_, as you known it. It's just been blown out of proportion by idiots on the internet."

America shrugged. "Whatever, dude. It's still hilarious. I wish I had a four hundred foot zip wire that I could go down across rivers."

"It was four hundred _metres_, _Amerique_," France corrected him. "You only refuse to use the metric system because I invented it. One ten-thousandth of the distance from the North Pole to the Equator, passing through Paris."

England sighed again and quickly zoned out their bickering, wondering why he'd invited those two along with him. It would have been so much more peaceful if he'd have come here by himself, just watching the torch with trusty camera. If it hadn't been quite so lonely, he'd almost be longing for the days of Splendid Isolation.

But all that aside, it was a good year to be British, England had decided. Even more so than it was normally for him. First the Diamond Jubilee celebrations, Dickens' bicentennial, getting into the final eight of Euro 2012 and now the fast approach of the long-awaited Olympics. Union flags were everywhere at the moment. If only debt, recession and Euro crises would get resolved, then he could just kick back and relax for a few peaceful decades with no disruptions.

"Aw, sweet! A hotdog stand!"

"Let's go, _Angleterre_! Or would you prefer me to chase you~?"

England sighed fondly. Or maybe not.

* * *

It's not obvious at all what I did today. :P

First story I've written in less than a day! Yay for no more school! But then it had to be done today, otherwise it'd be out of date.  
First story in a while that's not about Spain and Romano either. I rather like writing England, France and America's bickering. They're a funny trio.


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